According to statistics, one out of every ten people in the world lives on an island. However, not all islands are the same, and some of them are not even suitable for living; others literally give us the shivers.
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Yemenis and foreign tourists gather to admire an example of the Dragon Blood tree on the virtually untouched Yemeni Island of Socotra, a site of global importance for biodiversity conservation, located in the northwestern Indian Ocean, some 350km south of the Arabian Peninsula, on March 27, 2008. Socotra is the main island of an archipelago of the same name, sometimes referred to as "the Galapagos of the Indian Ocean." The island is historically famous for its unique and spectacular vegetation -- botanists rank the flora of Socotra among the ten most endangered groups of island flora in the world -- and now the opening of an airport in 1999 and other infrastructure developments are turning Socotra into a possible off-beat eco-tourist destination. The Dragon Blood tree is unique to the island.
© AFP 2023 / Khaled Fazaa
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TO GO WITH "Lifestyle-Japan-Animal-Cat" by Miwa Suzuki
Kazuko Hatakeyama feeds some 20 cats at her residence at Tashiro island in Miyagi prefecture, northern Japan on November 1, 2008. The fishing village of Tashiro, known locally as Cat Island, has shunned dogs for centuries in the belief that cats invite a big catch. The island's 100 residents, whose average age is well over 70, are hoping that cats will become a drawcard in a campaign to attract tourists and, hopefully, people who want to settle down here.
Kazuko Hatakeyama feeds some 20 cats at her residence at Tashiro island in Miyagi prefecture, northern Japan on November 1, 2008. The fishing village of Tashiro, known locally as Cat Island, has shunned dogs for centuries in the belief that cats invite a big catch. The island's 100 residents, whose average age is well over 70, are hoping that cats will become a drawcard in a campaign to attract tourists and, hopefully, people who want to settle down here.
© AFP 2023 / Miwa Suzuki
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A picture taken on May 3, 2017 shows Fort Boyard, off the western coast of France, near La Rochelle
The fort is the filming location for the TV gameshow "Fort Boyard". The show, launched in 1990 in France and bought by almost forty countries, made the fort, located between the island of Oleron and the island of Aix, a famous monument. All year round, sea trips take thousands of people to admire the austere silhouette of the building, accessible only by boat or helicopter.
The fort is the filming location for the TV gameshow "Fort Boyard". The show, launched in 1990 in France and bought by almost forty countries, made the fort, located between the island of Oleron and the island of Aix, a famous monument. All year round, sea trips take thousands of people to admire the austere silhouette of the building, accessible only by boat or helicopter.
© AFP 2023 / Mehdi Fedouach
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The Bahamas' remote Exuma islands are home to swimming pigs